SASKATOON (Staff) – Agriculture Canada scientist Paul McCaughey has been researching the feasibility of grazing cattle on alfalfa pasture for nearly 10 years.
His Brandon Research Centre pastures average 70 percent alfalfa, 20 percent meadow bromegrass and 10 percent Russian wild rye which averaged 27 percent crude protein.
In four years of tests using continuous and rotational grazing under high and low stocking rates, he has lost just one steer to bloat. In the past two years gains have consistently averaged three pounds per day, he said.
“The stuff’s just like jet fuel,” McCaughey said of the animals’ ability to gain.
The cost of backgrounding the steers on pasture in 1994 – the last year with complete figures – was 30 cents per lb. compared to 66 cents in the feedlot. That’s including the cost of Bloatguard boluses or Rumensin CRC as a bloat preventative.
He said he expects the advantage of gains on alfalfa pasture to be even wider in the 1995 figures because of high barley prices.
